This TV movie which was one of Kim Basinger's first films had the potential to be trashy fun but ends up rather predictable and slow moving, only giving a few signs of the fun little campy film it could have been. She goes from small town beauty queen in Texas to a pin-up girl, finding that things aren't exactly what they seem when she signs up with a modeling agency run by sisters Vivian Blaine and Dorothy Malone. The two fading glamour girls promise her lots of a claim doing legitimate modeling, but all that ends up happening is a centerfold in a trashy girly magazine. When she returns to her small town, she finds she's the subject of ridicule and harassment, and even aunt Nan Martin (who seems to be the only one who truly supported her) can't get others around the family to understand why such things happen to a seemingly nice girl.
It seems like this was going out of its way not to be another troubled teen movie, trying to be too clean in spite of some scenes that insinuate that what's going on isn't so legit. It's nice to see the veterans in the cast, as well as a few rising newcomers, but outside of Basinger's promising performance that indicates stardom is waiting for her, there's little of Interest on this since we've seen this plot done so much better or at least a lot more fun over the years. This certainly is better than "Showgirls", but that film was more fun to laugh at. So if you just want a cleaned up version of what kind of sleaze Hollywood was trying to prevent young girls from becoming involved in back in the day, then this is the one to seek out, but it only gives slight reality to the genuine issues that could have been dealt with so much better had this attempted to be daring.
It seems like this was going out of its way not to be another troubled teen movie, trying to be too clean in spite of some scenes that insinuate that what's going on isn't so legit. It's nice to see the veterans in the cast, as well as a few rising newcomers, but outside of Basinger's promising performance that indicates stardom is waiting for her, there's little of Interest on this since we've seen this plot done so much better or at least a lot more fun over the years. This certainly is better than "Showgirls", but that film was more fun to laugh at. So if you just want a cleaned up version of what kind of sleaze Hollywood was trying to prevent young girls from becoming involved in back in the day, then this is the one to seek out, but it only gives slight reality to the genuine issues that could have been dealt with so much better had this attempted to be daring.